


Tomorrow's Never-Ending Yesterday (412.M41)

by Sister of Silence (Orcbait)



Series: Aegis of Atonement [6]
Category: Warhammer 40.000
Genre: Drama, F/M, M/M, Mystery
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-08-02
Updated: 2013-08-02
Packaged: 2017-12-22 06:01:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/909758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Orcbait/pseuds/Sister%20of%20Silence
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After concluding their individual investigations, Inquisitors Genevieve Von Saar and Gregor Eisenhorn plan a brief respite. However, their improvised sabbatical does not exactly go as planned...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tomorrow's Never-Ending Yesterday (412.M41)

**Author's Note:**

> Set about a decade or so after the Eisenhorn Trilogy, when these two have already been... hrm... 'associates'... for a little while. If you catch my drift.

It had been early in the year 412.M41 when chance found us reunited. It was on Flint, a low-tech Agri-world in the northern quadrant of the Angelus sub. Genevieve had been there at the behest of the Deacon of Flint to investigate rumours of Chaos worship tainting the pagan beliefs of the native human tribes, who herded the elephantine demi-pachyderms that were the planet's main tithe. My own investigation had led me to this world for entirely different reasons. However, as I had concluded my research when we ran into one another, and it had been some time since last we’d met, I agreed to join her as she rounded up her own investigation with the intent of spending some quality time together afterwards. That didn’t quite turn out the way I had hoped.

  


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Flint did not have the planet-spanning hive-world civilisation that I had grown up with. Instead, most of the planet was covered in rolling plains, dotted with the temporary camps of the natives. The urbanisation, such as it was, was a category all its own: too large and urban to be true villages, and yet too spread and unpopulated to be called cities. These townships were most reminiscent of the sprawling suburbs of a hive, only then without the actual hive attached to them. They formed a depressing stain on the otherwise tranquil landscape: cast in low rockrete and cheap ductsteel not a decade ago, the buildings were already crumbling under their own weight. There was debris and litter everywhere and the streets were largely deserted, and though the few people we met were polite, they were wary of strangers. Considering that Genevieve had brought a squad of armed Storm Troopers with her one could hardly find fault with them for that. 

Beside the Storm Troopers Genevieve always employed a rather extensive retinue, but when we met it had been remarkably small. There had been Jannick Malnis, a Commissarial cadet who had been her interrogator at the time. Under her careful tutorship the reckless youth I recalled had grown into a stoic, invariably deadpan man with an uncanny knack for reading and manipulating people, despite having the psychic potential of a teaspoon. He also had the quiet conviction and tenacity of an Obscura-hound on a scent, all of which had served her well over the past years. At the time she had been sitting on putting him to a master's test for his rosette, and had mildly complained no suitably complicated investigation had yet occurred. The astropath Breena had been with her as well. The soul-binding had left her both blind and mildly addled, but she had served her well during their stay on Flint. And then there had been the young rogue, Gave Morton, who was almost as insufferable a prankster as Haines, but at least had qualities as an expert sneak and lock pick above and beyond anything Genevieve and I could ever hope to accomplish. I suspected Genevieve had plans to take him on as her acolyte after Malnis. Lastly there had been Var’khan, a tribesman she had picked up during her investigation, who had been weary of the dreary hunter-gatherer’s life of his tribe. He had pledged himself to her, certain that she’d provide him with a road of golden grass to Varhar Nar’hin Kan – their afterlife. In that she would sooner, rather than later, see him off to his afterlife he was undoubtedly correct, although whether it would be paved in golden grain stalks remained to be seen.

At the time, we had concluded her investigation and had been on the road for a goodly while, making our way due south to the starport of Norstock. We had decided to take the Viringard pass directly through the Clacton Mountains, as this would cut down our travelling time by many hours, perhaps a day. We couldn’t have been more wrong. The shortcut wound up adding weeks to our journey, for we stumbled upon something in those mountains which ought never to have seen the light of day. And though we escaped its clutches in the end we were left in low spirits. Bizarre as it may sound, in the days after neither of us felt quite… _complete_.

“You will want to take the road straight up ahead here, good lady,” the man at the promethium station said with a decisive nod. “Leads straight up to the pass, it does.” He was a stocky man in the later part of his life, which had been one of hard work judging by the grooves on his face and callouses on his hands.

“Thank you very much,” Genevieve replied, cordial as ever, while paying for the fuel and other supplies we had bought, including food and drink for on the road. The man handed her a clipboard and after glancing across it she signed it, her hand twisting through the elaborate flourishes of her signature.

“I thought it was only a day’s drive?” Morton jested as he picked up the two cloth bags bulging with our purchases.

“There’s fifteen of us, not five,” I reminded him as I beckoned Malnis and Var'khan, and picked up one of the four promethium barrels. Malnis took the second and Var'khan the last two, holding one in each hand as if they weighed nothing at all; and perhaps, to him, they didn't.

“Better take care up in them mountains and drive straight and true,” the man commented as we moved to leave his small stall. “There is nothing up there, and it can get right funny at night I heard.”

“Truly?” I heard Genevieve ask as we walked back to the speeders, obvious interest in her voice. She lingered for a moment, undoubtedly intent on taking the man up on his idle remark. Small town folk are that way, local rumours are what spices up their mundane lives, and experience has taught the both of us that local rumours are often the innocent leavings of the sort of business we seek to rout. I moved to follow the others, if there was anything to his prattle she’d tell me.

Most of the Storm Troopers stood around the speeders, stretching their legs and smoking a quick lho-stick. Corporal Jason Jilks, our pilot and mechanic, was bending over into the engine cabin of one of our speeders. “Everything’s in order, Inquisitor,” he said when he saw me, wiping his hands on the sides of his pants. 

“Good,” I replied with a nod and put down the promethium barrel, after which Var’khan proceeded to help him with refuelling the speeders and stowing away the extra barrels we’d brought. Being a tribesman this ‘techno–thing’, as he called it, was all wonderfully new to him. He hid it outwardly reasonably well, but he was psychically broadcasting his eagerness to learn more about it as obviously as the sun did light. 

Breena still sat in our speeder and I don’t believe she had moved at all since she sat down hours ago. Malnis glanced at Genevieve, who was still talking to the tender, and relit the lho-stick he’d started prior to being drafted into helping her with the groceries. As ever, he gestured to offer me one too, despite knowing very well that I don’t smoke. As ever, I declined. 

Morton had flopped down onto the pavement after stowing the bags of groceries in the trunk of our speeder, sitting down with his legs crossed and his eyes closed as he leaned back on his hands, seemingly enjoying the afternoon sun. I contended myself with leaning against the speeder’s side and simply waited. It wasn't long until Genevieve joined us.

“People seem to have gone up the pass and never returned,” she commented, her voice only slightly lowered, as she reached me. The way Morton leaned his head sideways in the sun at that made it obvious the young man had not stopped paying attention to his surroundings. 

“I see,” I replied, watching from the corner of my eyes how Malnis idly strolled away from the Storm Troopers and into our direction now that he had seen us exchange words. “How do they know this?”

“It would seem you cannot cross the pass on one tank alone,” she motioned at the speeders with her hand. “That is why I bought the extra barrels. However, as a precaution, travellers have to sign a passage registry before heading through the pass and, once they are through it, sign it off at the station on the other side.” She was silent for a moment, and Malnis joined us. “Across the years there have been signatures that only show up on this end of the passage registry.”

“Accidents?” Malnis asked, though I was certain she had explored that angle.

“No bodies, but one abandoned vehicle a few years ago,” she replied, giving me a brief, foreboding look. “Nothing else.”

“How did he explain it?” I asked, nodding towards the station.

Genevieve shrugged a little and smiled, humour returning to her eyes. “Xeno slave raiders, man-eating yetis, mad scientist abductions, mysterious roads to nowhere – the usual.”

“Better keep our eyes open and ears pricked then,” I added, unable to express a smile in return. The disappearances were an oddity, but it would seem one that warranted more the attention of the local Arbites than that of the Inquisition.

“Certainly,” Genevieve nodded, then turned and waved her arm to attract the attention of the others. “Let’s get going again; it’s a long trip yet.” She then glanced back at me. “Shall I drive?”

“No, I am fine,” I replied, shaking my head as I held the door open to her. She looked me up and down as she got in, clearly doubting my words. Closing the door I walked around and got into the driver’s seat. I was a little tired, we’d already been on the road for hours, but I would manage. Her haphazard driving style left me queasy on the best of roads, and a snaking mountain pass was hardly the place for it unless we wanted to add ourselves to the non-duplicate signatures.

  


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The way up the mountain had been a crawl through all but impossible U-turns, and I was in hindsight glad I had decided to continue driving despite my tiredness. Letting Genevieve take these turns would have brought us all far closer to the Emperor than any of us but she would have liked. As before, Malnis, Morton, Var'khan and Breena were on our back seat, while the Storm Troopers followed behind us in the other two speeders. In the hours since we had left the station, evening had begun to fall. With a little luck we’d make it to the chem-lighted tunnel before night fell in earnest.

“If you want to switch...” Genevieve said for what felt like the billionth time.

“I am fine,” I replied, my gaze nailed to the road ahead of us and the next turn.

“When you get tired–” she replied, changing her tactic, just like the previous time she’d asked.

“I am not, I’ll be fine,” I cut in before she could finish.

Morton’s head appeared between ours as he leaned forward, a mocking grin around his lips. “Mom, dad, the kids don’t like it when you fight,” he said, and I saw Genevieve roll her eyes out of the corner of my own. Morton was quiet for a moment, then added: “Are we there yet?”

“NO!” we shouted at the same time, too late realising he’d been jesting.

“Funny,” I added, momentarily flicking my gaze to him, and surely enough he was grinning twice as broad.

“Sit back down or I’ll ‘ground you’ for the next investigation, _Gavriel_ ,” Genevieve said tersely. Morton sat down with a theatrical sigh. Absolutely wonderful, we hadn't even _entered_ the two-hundred and seventy kilometre tunnel yet.

It was truly getting dark by then and we were still crawling our way up the mountain. I don’t think any of us had any real idea of how far it was to the tunnel, but we must have been nearing it by now. This feeling was strengthened when we came through what appeared to be the last turn as the road took a curve straight towards the mountain. And yet, it was no tunnel mouth it led us to. To my astonishment we rounded up onto a fair sized parking lot with no road connection aside from the one we had just left, and a large manor looming behind the trees some hundred odd metres beyond.

“This can’t be right,” Genevieve remarked as I pulled up, and I knew what she meant to add before she did so – before she had even fully thought it for that matter.

“No, I didn’t miss the juncture, there were no junctures,” I cut in. “And if there were, you didn’t see them either.” She closed her mouth again, frowning.

“The tender at the station said there was nothing else up here,” she restarted cautiously as she eyed me, and then glanced outside across the parking lot.

Realising I’d snapped at her, I reined in my weariness and annoyance. “Clearly, there is something,” I returned, though the look she shot me urged me to follow up with: “the _tender_ must have been wrong.”

“I didn’t see anything, either,” Malnis commented from behind us.

“I am pretty sure there wasn’t anything,” Morton chipped in happily as he leaned forward again, and motioned towards the manor in the distance. “Let's just go up there and ask the good folks where we took a wrong turn.”

I nodded. “I don’t much fancy driving down again looking for something we’re all certain wasn’t there,” I added thoughtfully. This was most peculiar, to say the least. I racked my memory but I was very certain there had not been any juncture, not since we had crossed onto this road from the promethium station.

“Gregor,” Genevieve said, turning in her seat, the note of concern in her voice interrupting my thoughts. “Where are Elric and his men?” There was no sign of the other two speeders.

**Author's Note:**

> NOTE: A lot of time and hard work went into the creation and publication of this story and as such it is very dear to me. I would love to hear what you thought of it. And please, share this story freely but credit me and link back to me. Thank you!


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